"The real starting point of all philosophy is self love, the effort to persist in one's own being. The longing not to die, as Spinoza said, is our essence and the affective basis of all knowledge . . . I am given reasons against immortality, but it is not with reasons that the heart is appeased. To live is not my right, but it is my necessity . . . I will not abdicate my life -- my life must be wrested from me."